Frequently you have opined
That among our poets you don't find
Much poetry in their verse
But verse in their poetry - much worse
Claiming this is and that ain't
A poem are poetry at any rate
So if you have criterion show 'em
What exactly makes a poem?

To be a poem must it rhyme?
Much that same as currently I'm
Doing - hoping 'tis poetry.
For if it's not oh, woe is me.

Do you think that blank verse, with a less than German regard for form and policy can't possible be poetry? Do you wash your hands of it's thalidomide charm? Tack it to the cross and write it's infirmity in specks of expatriate blood? Art thou poetry's Pilate?

Is it
graffitti to your eyes
when
words
outside the structure
lie?
is this a poem?
to
you?

A simple question to you from me -
What, to your mind, constitutes poetry?

------But would I be a good Messiah with my low self-esteem? / If I don't believe in myself would that be blasphemy? - The Bloodhound Gang Hell Yeah

Comments

The following comments are for "To Gomarsoap: A Question"by Enforced Bliss

An Answer
Dear Enforced Bliss-
It doesn't matter to me if a poem rhymes or not. I don't care if it's free verse, blank verse, prose poem, minimalism, concrete, whatever. But it's got to have poetry!

Just because something looks like a poem and is called a poem doesn't necessarily mean it has poetry in it.

What I'm saying is there is poetry in everything but you have to find it and put it down in words that illuminate or express something fresh about something we see or feel in our lives. Or a new way of looking at something or bringing out a truth in something that is difficult to put into words.

You ought to see some of the crap I've written over the years! But at least I know it isn't good & why.

The late poet Charles Bukowski once said, in effect, "I see where God has created a lot of poets, but not very much poetry."

By the way, I think your poem here does have poetry in it but not as much as that one you wrote about the old woman with the U-shaped peed pant getting hauled off. Sorry I forget the title, but I liked that one.